So… today was my first stint as a Poet in the Cafe! Very low key as Mike (the owner of La Tropicana) and I are still working out a modus operandi in terms of best days and times for me to be there. Between 12 noon and 2 pm seems to be optimum for numbers of cafe patrons, although today I was there a bit later. Even so there were four people stopped to chat, two whom I know and two strangers. Not bad considering that so far there’s no poster or other indication of who I am or what I’m doing apart from a copy of my poetry collection on the table.
I’m hoping to have articles in both Fremantle’s local papers (Herald and Gazette) in the next week or two. And a big poster stuck in the window indicating days and times I will be in the cafe.
I didn’t write any poetry today but I did write quite a lot related to my novella project which is part of my PhD program. I’ll talk more about that in subsequent posts but for now, here’s another fairly recently minted poem.
Book End
I am tired of all these readers
Who take up a book for a few hours
To annul their boredom
To pass the time
They always want the thrill
Without the passion
The danger without the harm
Sitting in their armchairs
Luxuriating in their cosseted rooms
Of safe and comfortable escape
Vicariously entering worlds of horror and spite
But not truly perilous.
Well, now we shall see
For I will write this tale
In congruous binds with mayhem
To devour their sweet sentimentality,
To choke their wide innocence
With ghastly description, with terrifying action,
With such malicious imaginings
That they will be undone
Unto the ends of their lives.
Now let the villainy begin!
Open these pages I dare you!
Slide into my world of mischief and malfeasance
Sink into a quagmire of wickedness
Come dance with death
Confront hideous nightmare
Shiver with the delicious delight of dread
But this time there’ll be no fantasy
This time you’ll not escape
Back to your ordinary, dull complacencies.
This time when you come to the end of the book
You’ll come to the end of you.
This should probably end with something like “Argh, ha, ha, ha!” Hope you enjoy it.
Ruari Jack Hughes